It Didn’t Catch Fire

I have a story for you, about something that happened to me the other day, that I think really makes the point about the relative danger of owning and EV that carries around 800-1,000 pounds of battery pack vs. a car that carries around about 130 pounds of gasoline.

You’ve undoubtedly heard about EVs going up in smoke – spontaneously combusting – sometimes when they’re not even moving. Or had something moving run into them (a la the Pintos that sometimes caught fire back in the ’70s, when they were rear ended by another car). This can happen at any time and without the owner having done (or not done) something that turned out later to have been the thing that triggered the fire. The fire just happens. No warning. And when it happens, it happens fast – and furious. The chemical fire burns viciously hot and is very hard to put out without specialized equipment, such as a bag big enough to put the burning EV in to snuff it out or a dumpster filled with sand, to contain it. EV fires have taken down two cargo ship and several buildings/parking garages.

This sets the stage for what happened to me the other day. What didn’t happen, to put it more accurately.

I fired up (ha!) the Trans-Am, to take a joy ride and to fill the gas tank while gas is still under $4 per gallon (by next week, it might be over $4 again, depending on how the war with Iran that never ends goes). I caught a whiff of gas while still in the garage, but since my garage is a place of many spills, I didn’t pay much attention to it. I ought to have.

I stabbed the gas pedal to relax the choke – this is part of the warm-up process with a carbureted (pre-fuel-injection) old car. The choke mechanically richens up (more gas) the air/fuel ratio when the engine is cold, which helps get it started. Once it warms up, the choke – which is just a door on top of the carburetor that restricts how much air can get into the engine – is released by stabbing the gas pedal quickly; the engine then settles down into a normal idle and you’re all set to go.

I backed out of the garage, headed down the driveway and began my roundabout drive to the Marathon gas station where I usually fill up. The TA was running great and I was feeling good. I rolled up to the pumps, got out and got the pump going. I left the engine running, which I chiefly do because sometimes the old 455 is hard to start after it’s been running hot for awhile. The RA III exhaust manifolds, which are basically cast iron headers, are heat soaks and big and thick ones, too. The one on the driver’s side is pretty close to the starter motor and that heat transfer sometimes causes the starter motor to bind up. So I just leave the engine running when I know I’m only stopping for a couple of minutes.

After I had pumped in about half a tankful, I walked in to pay for the gas. This is a local joint and I know the owner and always like to stop in and say hello. Well, when I walked back out to the car, I smelled gas again – but didn’t dwell on the smell since I was at a gas station and sometimes there is spillage. I got back in the car and headed back home, about seven miles distant.  I rolled into the garage and shut the engine off and now the gas smell was enough to make me think. And look. I got out and saw a puddle of liquid expanding from under the front end to adjacent the driver’s side tire. I popped the hood and saw where it was coming from. The rubber fuel line that connects the metal return line that runs back to the gas tank to the fuel pump had failed. Pressurized gasoline had been arterially spurting all over the subframe and also the lower part of the engine, very close to the piping hot driver’s side exhaust manifold.

Yet no fire.

Think about that. Highly combustible gasoline, spraying almost directly on a very hot engine and it didn’t combust. Because – thank the Motor Gods – there was no spark.  The Trans-Am did not burn to the ground. Neither did most Pintos that were slammed in the rear end by another car – unless the impact was severe enough to sever the fuel filler neck that connected to the gas tank and in the process of shearing off, a spark was created. Absent that, what you had was a spill – not a catastrophe.

With EVs, you do not need a spark to have a fire. Lithium-ion batteries can just catch fire.

So which would you rather drive – given how difficult it is, relatively speaking, to get a gas-engined car to burn vs. how easy it is for a battery-powered vehicle to burn itself to the ground?

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